Protect and defend (31 page)

Rapp smiled. “A soldier. That’s interesting. Most of the soldiers I know wear uniforms.”

The man closed his mouth tightly and shut his eyes.

“That body part there,” Rapp pointed to the organ on the floor, “belongs to one of your comrades. I told him not to lie to me. I told him I had plenty of ways to verify what he was saying. He thought he was smarter than me. Do you think you’re smarter than me?”

“No.”

“Good…then this should go much smoother. Let’s start with your name, and look me in the eye when you answer.” Rapp cocked his head slightly to the left and studied the man’s face.

“Corporal Nouri Tahmineh.”

“Where were you born?”

The man hesitated.

“This is the speed round, buddy. Rapid-fire. You don’t have to think about these. Just answer. I got five guys in another room that can hack into any computer system in the world. I’ve got another room full of people back in Washington working the phones. We’ve got spies in every frickin’ government in the region. Right now they’re calling around about you and if what you say is true, and you’re a soldier, we’ll find your military records. If the photo doesn’t match the name, or we can’t find you, I’m going to cut off your left nut just like I told you I would. Your friend there,” Rapp pointed to the object on the floor. “He gave me the wrong name, the wrong town, and a bullshit date of birth. He made it real easy for me. I just cut everything off in one fell swoop. You probably heard him screaming like the peckerless little pussy that he now is.”

Rapp pulled out his knife and extended the blade. “Here’s how dumb the guy is. After all that…he’s in so much goddamn pain he ends up telling me his name anyway. The point is, you’re going to end up telling me everything, so you might as well hold on to your manhood.” Rapp pointed the tip of the knife at the man’s crotch. “Now, are you ready for the speed round?”

The prisoner nodded quickly.

“Name?” Rapp fired the question like a drill sergeant.

“Corporal Nouri Tahmineh.”

“Place of birth?”

“Qom.”

The only city Rapp knew of by that name was approximately 100 miles southwest of Tehran. “Date of birth?”

“Fourteenth of January, nineteen-eighty-two.”

“You said you’re a soldier. What unit?”

“Twenty-Third Special Forces Division. Jerusalem Force.”

Rapp kept his emotions in check. The man sitting before him was not some insurgent volunteer. He was an Iranian soldier. A member of their elite Quds Force or, as some of the more anti-Semitic men referred to it, Jerusalem Force. His involvement in the kidnapping of Kennedy caused Rapp to see things in an entirely different light.

“How long have you been in Iraq?” Rapp asked while he tried to think of the implications of direct Iranian involvement.

“Almost two months.”

“All of it in Mosul?”

“Mostly…and the surrounding area.”

Rapp wondered if Minister Ashani had ordered this. Up until now, he had thought the man very reasonable. Now he wondered if the sincerity he had shown Kennedy was all an act. “You married?”

The man looked away nervously and hesitated.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Engaged.”

Good leverage,
Rapp thought to himself. He unzipped the thigh pocket on his coveralls, and pulled out the stack of Polaroids. He flipped through until he found the one he was looking for. He held the stack in front of Tahmineh’s face and said, “Careful on this one. Name and rank, just like it says in the Geneva Convention. Which also says you’re supposed to be in uniform, but we’ll talk about that later.”

The young Iranian looked at the photo and hesitated.

“Your fiancée,” Rapp started, “will never marry you if the goods are damaged.” Rapp could tell the speed had taken full effect. Tahmineh’s knees were shaking and his eyes were darting around the room. “Look at me!” Rapp screamed. “Is she pretty?”

“Who?” the man asked genuinely confused.

“Your fiancée.”

“Yes.”

Rapp stuck the tip of the knife up against the man’s crotch. “Then you’re screwed. No way in hell a good-looking Persian woman is going to marry a guy without a dick. Now quit fucking around, and tell me who this is and remember I might already know his name. This could be a test and if you fail, off comes the first nut.”

“Captain Rashid Dadarshi…my commanding officer.”

Captain
was the equivalent of a captain in the U.S. Army. “When were you told who you would be kidnapping?”

Tahmineh looked nervous. “I was never told.”

“Never?” Rapp said forcefully.

“Never. We were only told it was an American, and that we were not to harm her.”

Rapp looked at him skeptically even though he had a suspicion the man was telling the truth.

“We were only told yesterday of the plan.”

“Who told you?”

“Captain Dadarshi, of course.”

“No one else?”

Tahmineh shook his head.

“Then who the hell is this?” Rapp shuffled through the photos and held up the one of the man who had been dressed as a police officer.

Tahmineh took one look at the photo and his face twisted into a disgusted scowl. “That is a Palestinian dog. He is not part of my unit.”

“Name?” Rapp barked.

“Ali Abbas,” the man offered willingly.

“If he isn’t Quds Force, then who is he with?”

“Hezbollah.”

“Hezbollah,” Rapp repeated as he stood. “What the fuck is Hezbollah doing in Mosul?”

“I do not know. I am only a corporal.”

Rapp had a good sense that the man was telling him the truth, but he needed to keep him on the edge for a bit longer. He stuck his knife under the Iranian’s chin and lifted it until he was looking straight into his eyes. “I’m going to go check your story, and if I find out you lied to me about a single thing, I’ll be back for your nuts.”

Rapp closed the door to the cell, and hustled down the hallway. The looped recording of a man being tortured was playing on the overhead speakers. Rapp ignored the agonizing screams and grappled with the implications of what he’d just learned. From the onset of the attack on Kennedy’s motorcade he’d assumed it was Sunnis who were behind the plan. The Sunnis ran the police force and had been known to work with al-Qaeda in Iraq on a limited basis. Iranian and Hezbollah involvement brought things into a much more complicated light. At first Rapp couldn’t believe they would be so reckless as to actually kidnap the sitting director of the CIA, but the more he thought about it, the less he was surprised. Clearly these were desperate men willing to take great risks to hold on to power.

Dumond had set up shop in the conference room. He had two of his high-powered laptops plugged into full-size monitors and was working both. Stilwell was sitting next to him taking notes and helping translate.

Rapp stopped in the doorway. “Any luck?”

“Not yet.” Dumond didn’t bother to look up from the screen. “I’m not sure the Iranian Army has these personnel records on their network.”

Rapp was afraid of that. “What about public databases? Motor vehicle registry, utilities, birth records?”

“I’m searching all of them.”

Ridley joined Rapp in the doorway. He was holding a stack of freshly printed 5x6 photos. “These just came in.” Ridley handed the stack to Rapp, who began peeling through them. “That first one is of Minister Ashani right after he arrived.”

Rapp reached the third photo and Ridley stopped him. The vantage was from the front of the helicopter and showed Ashani walking to the right. On the left side of the helicopter there was another man in a dark suit walking in the opposite direction. “Who’s this?”

“I don’t know.”

Rapp flipped through a couple more photos and stopped on a head shot of the mystery man. The digital photo had been cropped and blown up. The quality wasn’t perfect, but it was still easy to make out the man’s features. He had a dark brown beard and even though he was wearing sunglasses there was something vaguely familiar about him. Rapp continued going through the shots and stopped on the second to last one. It showed the mystery man climbing into a police SUV that was bracketed by two police pickup trucks, both with .50-caliber machine guns mounted to the roofs.

Rapp quickly shuffled back to the best photo of the mystery man and handed Ridley the rest of the stack. “Charlie’s in the Situation Room with the president, right?”

“Yes.”

“Get on the horn with him and tell him we’re ninety percent sure Iran is behind the kidnapping of Irene.”

“Ninety percent?” Ridley questioned. “We haven’t even verified that this Tahmineh is who he says he is.”

“That’s why I didn’t say one hundred. Trust me, Rob, we need to get the National Security Council talking about this. If it is Iran, it’ll take them half a day to figure out who the hell to even call.” Rapp began moving toward the door. “Irene doesn’t have that kind of time.”

Rapp went straight back to Tahmineh’s cell. He threw open the steel door, walked right up to the seated and handcuffed man, and thrust the photo in his face. “Who is this guy?”

The Iranian’s eyes were literally bugging out of his head and he was sweating profusely. “I don’t know.”

“Bullshit!” Rapp screamed.

“I mean I don’t know his name. I don’t know him. I saw him for the first time today.”

Rapp felt his jaw tighten. Through clenched teeth, he asked, “When and where?”

“It was this morning. Right before the attack. We had been moved into position before dawn and were waiting. He showed up maybe an hour before the attack and took over.”

“Is he special forces?”

“No.” The prisoner frantically shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“He gave Captain Dadarshi orders?”

“Yes.”

“Was he from the Ministry of Intelligence?”

“I don’t know,” the man pleaded.

Rapp eyed him. There were no signs that he was being anything less than truthful. “You have no idea who the man is?”

“No.”

It would stand to reason that the mystery man worked for Ashani, and it would also stand to reason that a lowly corporal would have no idea who the man was. Rapp did not want to try to figure out his next move in front of the prisoner. He left the cell without saying another word and closed and locked the door. He began pacing up and down the hall while the torture track played as background noise. His mind turned the facts over and over, looking at each bit of information from every angle he could think of. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen it earlier.

Rapp snatched the two-way radio from his hip. He hit the talk button and said, “Rob, get me a number for Minister Ashani.”

The helicopter ride from Mosul to the border had taken just twenty minutes. The Air Force had a relatively small Dassault Falcon 10 waiting to take him to Tehran. For most of the hour-and-ten-minute flight Ashani made notes to himself. They were cryptic so as to protect him if somehow they should fall into the wrong hands, which was doubtful since he planned to destroy them as soon as he got to his office. He’d hesitated even making the notes, but he wanted to organize his thoughts and be very clear about what Kennedy had offered on behalf of the U.S. government.

There was another reason he had opened the notepad. Ashani wanted to make a list of objections, or more precisely a list of who would object. There were more than a few people in Tehran whose power would evaporate if peace was made with America. It would make no difference that the American offer made complete sense. President Amatullah would do everything in his power to make sure the offer was rejected. That was why Ashani had opted not to call the president during his brief border stop. He needed to talk to Najar first. As head of the Guardian Council he could influence many people if he was persuaded. If Amatullah found out first, he would find some way to have his P. R. machine kill the offer before it was ever seriously considered.

Shortly after the plane landed in Tehran, Ashani looked out the window and got a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. In addition to his normal car and driver there were two additional vehicles and another eight armed men. Ashani looked at his security chief, Rahad Tehrani, who had the same look of concern on his face.

“Stay here,” Tehrani said, “and I will see what the problem is.”

Ashani glanced out the window and watched his security chief approach the group of men. At that precise moment he realized he had forgotten to turn his cell phone on upon landing. Ashani hit the power button and watched the color screen come to life. A picture of a spinning globe flashed on the screen before it changed to a list of icons and then the phone started to beep as it retrieved voice mails first and then e-mails. After a few seconds the beeping stopped, and Ashani saw that he had eight voice mail messages and twenty-three new e-mails. The amount was not unheard-of, but it was a bit high. He was about to begin scrolling through the e-mails, when the phone began ringing. The readout on the phone would tell him only that the information on the person who was calling was unavailable.

Ashani pressed the talk button and said, “Hello?”

“Minister Ashani?” the caller said in English.

“Yes.”

“This is Mitch Rapp. I work for Director Kennedy. Do you know who I am?”

Ashani glanced nervously out the window and said as casually as he could, “I’m afraid everyone in our line of work is aware of your reputation.”

“Good. Then you’ll know how serious I am when I tell you that I’m going to kill you.”

“Excuse me?” Ashani said in genuine surprise.

“I know what you’ve been up to. If Director Kennedy is not released in the next hour, I’m coming after you. And if, as you say, everyone in our line of work is aware of my reputation, then you know I will succeed. I will hunt your ass down and kill you, and no level of security will stop me.”

“Mr. Rapp, I can assure you that I have no idea what you are talking about, and I do not take kindly to your threats.”

“What are you going to do…take out a fatwa on me? Well, let me tell you something. I’m not some defenseless author who’s going to go into hiding because you thin-skinned little pricks decide I’ve offended Islam. I bite back, and I’m going to hunt down every single one of you fuckers that had anything to do with this.”